- All Timelines
- Britain - Changing Lives
- c.1066 |Medieval Manor
- c.1180 |Medieval Minds
- c.1250 |Medieval Towns
- c.1320 |Monastic Life
- c.1348 |The Black Death
- c.1420 |Yeoman England
- c.1520 |The Reformation
- c.1588 |Shakespeare's World
- c.1612 |Pendle Witches
- c.1775 |Iron and Industry
- c.1785 |Factories and Machines
- c.1810 |Urban Slums
- c.1834 |Tolpuddle Martyrs
- c.1853 |The Vision of Titus Salt
- c.1875 |Cities Transformed
- c.1910 |A Golden Age?
- c.1984 |Death of Industry
- Britain - Rulers & Ruled
- c.1066 |Norman Conquest
- c.1170 |Church & Crown
- c.1215 |Magna Carta
- c.1280 |First Parliaments
- c.1381 |Peasants Revolt
- c.1470 |The Pastons
- c.1528 |Henry VIII & Church
- c.1649 |Civil War
- c.1658 |The Wheel of History
- c.1688 |"Glorious" Revolution
- c.1789 |Rights of Man
- c.1819 |Peterloo Massacre
- c.1842 |The Chartists
- c.1867 |Dawn of Democracy
- c.1893 |Rise of Labour
- c.1903 |Votes for Women
- c.1919 |Century of Change
- Britain - Nations & Empire
- Smallpox Through Time
- c.1045BC |Face of a Pharaoh
- c.1562 |Arsenic and Old Lace
- c.1617 |Smallpox in America
- c.1711 |Child Pox
- c.1721 |Experiment in Newgate
- c.1758 |The Speckled Monster
- c.1796 |Jenner's Breakthrough
- c.1800 |The Vaccine Triumphant
- c.1806 |Ox-faced Boys
- c.1853 |Public Health & Protest
- c.1896 |Epidemic on Camera
- c.1967 |Global Action
- c.2010 |Smallpox Today
- The American West
- Britain - Changing Lives
- This Module
- With the coming of the railroads, the settlement of the Great Plains began - a process believed by many to be the 'manifest destiny' of the American people, and facilitated by the promise of free land. But first, the homesteaders had to tame a forbidding landscape, and this was no easy task. The module follows the story of Uriah and Mattie Oblinger, whose letters, written in 1872-3, describe the creation of their 'sodhouse', a house made from the only building material available: the matted roots of the Prairie grass itself.
- Credits
Seven Journeys in the American West
The letters of a homesteader couple describe the epic experience of the first white settlers on the Plains. (8.5 mins)
Chapter Breakdown
- 1. Settlers arrive on the Plains: the story of the Homesteaders.
- 2. The conquest of the Plains as the 'manifest destiny' of the American people.
- 3. Uriah Oblinger builds a sod house.
- 4. The photographs of Solomon Butcher record the experiences of the Nebraska homesteaders.
- 5. His sod house finished, Uriah brings his wife Mattie out west to join him.
Picture Viewer
Location details
The beautiful shots of tall grass prairie that open the module were shot at 9 Mile Prairie, a stretch of unspoilt grassland northwest of Lincoln, Nebraksa. It's one of the last surviving stretches of tall grass on the American Plains, and it's kept by the University of Nebraska for research purposes.
The reconstructed sodhouse described by Martin Leiwer can be found on the Oglala National Parklands in Northwest Nebraska. The sodhouse we filmed for the final sequence was built privately by Henry Kuhner in his garden; he lives in Malcom, Nebraska, about ten miles west of Lincoln.
DVD
DVD Coming Soon!
We hope to release a new DVD pack containing all the video modules for the British timelines including 'Changing Lives', 'Rulers & Ruled', and 'Empire & Nations'.
